Violation - David Rose

Columbus, Georgia has been run by the same tiny clique for over 100 years - the members of the all-white Big Eddy Club. This is the story of a fascinating and rotten community whose victims pay the ultimate price.

An atmospheric tale of murder, lynchings and the workings of justice in the hothouse of the American South, set in a beautiful, apparently tranquil community where bigotry and ancient hatreds lie just beneath the surface. Columbus has one of the lowest crime rates in the US, yet has sentenced to death more people per head of population than anywhere in the US - all of them black, almost all convicted of murdering white victims.

Columbus, Georgia, is to all intents and purposes run by the all-white members of the Big Eddy Club and has been for the past three generations. Almost everything that happens in Columbus is worked out in the confines of the racially and socially exclusive club and the same individuals and families crop up at every twist and turn of Columbus' history.

Nowhere is this better illustrated than in the cases of two black men: Simon Adams, who was lynched and murdered after breaking into a judge's house in June 1900; and Carlton Gary who sits, 100 years later, on Georgia's death row for a series of murders many people believe he did not commit, a victim of lynching by due process. What links the fate of these men is the Big Eddy Club - the same family names appear in both cases.

Uncovering the connections between the fate of Carlton Gary and the terrible events of the past reveals some important truths about America which many would like to stay hidden. David Rose intends to expose them and, if possible, to prove Gary's innocence.